


but i do not kill stars

by ultraviolence



Series: burned / about to burn / still on fire [1]
Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Fluff and Crack, Friendship, Gen, Platonic with a hint of romantic if you squint, crackfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-22
Updated: 2017-01-22
Packaged: 2018-09-19 05:17:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9420314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ultraviolence/pseuds/ultraviolence
Summary: "Strange as it may seem, she felt an odd sort of kinship with him, a sense of fire." // Krennic taught Jyn how to drive. Modern AU.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is really just something ridiculous and self-indulgent that came over me while I was writing my Galennic fics a while ago. While I'm not much of a romantic Jynnic shipper, I think they definitely had some similarities going on, and I wanted to explore that a bit. [Title inspiration](http://officialvoid.co.vu/post/155570269249/i-myself-have-lots-of-repressed-skies-but-i-do). Enjoy!

The day couldn’t be worse even if she tried.

Spring break was nearly over—thankfully, unlike high school, there was no homework to speak of, in college—and Jyn nearly obtained her license, if not for the fact that she nearly totaled the car her dad had gave her, only a few weeks earlier.

Rulebreaking runs in the family, and it was her mother’s idea that she be given access to a proper vehicle while she was still learning (which her dad agreed with, very reluctantly), but this definitely wouldn’t sit well with either of her parents. At best, she’d be given a slap in the wrist and would be grounded for the weekend, and at worst, well, she would really rather not think about it. Jyn Erso was most definitely the sort of person who do things first and then think of the consequences later.

She wondered if she should not tell them and let them find out on their own later, if they ever will. But all things considered, that would be a very bad idea, and she had a very bad feeling about it.

She unlocked the front door after briefly wrestling with hesitance, came out as the winner, and threw it to the backseat of her mind.

“Hey,” She called out, after entering, the standard Jyn greeting, “Anyone home?”

A noise sounded from somewhere upstairs, as if on cue, and, on instinct, she raced to the stairs, not caring that she haven’t taken off her shoes or her jacket yet. She had a strong feeling she knew what the noise was.

“Dad,” Jyn exclaimed, entering her father’s study, whose door was left pretty much ajar, “What are _you_ doing?”

Her father was half-standing from his seat behind the desk, the ruins of something sitting somewhere to his left, murky liquid all over the floor.

“I think I accidentally dropped my coffee,” He replied, sheepishly, tidying up his papers. Galen looked as he always did whenever he was busy researching, Jyn noted. Clearly vanity isn’t high on her family’s priority list. “But hey, Stardust. Busy day?”

“ _Again_? That’s the second time this week, pa. Soon we’re gonna buy every coffee mug this country has.” She wrinkled her nose at the mess on the floor, already making a mental note to fetch a rug. “Nah. My day sucks, though.”

Clearly her father read her mind, because he produced a stack of papers from one of his drawers, and used them to wipe the spilled coffee off the floor. Jyn raised an eyebrow, but doesn’t say anything about it.

“Since this happened pretty often…” He trailed off, sighing. Silence fell between them, and Jyn stood there, feeling a little awkward and more than a little out of place in her father’s study. As the only child of a world-renowned scientist (and almost equally famous travel writer), naturally, the people she grew up with, specifically the authority figures, expected her to go down the same path as her father, or perhaps her mother. She loved science—her father used to regale her with stories of discoveries and the wonders of the universe when she was little—although she hated numbers, and she also loved traveling, loved the feeling of a new place beckoning her from beyond the horizon, spent her adolescence knowing every nook and cranny of the suburb she’d grown up in, before they moved to Coruscant. But she doesn’t feel like either is right for her.

Her parents was pretty much the dream parents of teenagers (she’d be 19 this year) everywhere—they gave her a fair amount of freedom, was rather tolerant of her shortcomings, loved her to a fault—but, like everyone else her age, she knew that even their patience had a limit. And thus, she’d grown to resent her parents’ career, even if only in healthy doses. 

She felt out of place amongst all these books and research journals and scientific notes. She looked out the window, absent-mindedly, trying to make sense of the shape of clouds.

“Anything to say?” Her father quite abruptly said, pulling Jyn out of her reverie. She returned her gaze to him—he’d finished cleaning up the spilled liquid, but not the ruined mug—and shrugged. 

“It’s nothing,” She told him, fidgeting with her jacket’s button. Maybe it’s best if she breached the topic later. Maybe it’s best if she didn’t breach it _at all_.

“Jyn,” He simply said, patiently, but she knew that _he_ knew. It was pointless trying to hide anything from her father. She was a terrible liar, like her father before her. She blew out a breath, finding the tree outside the window to be suddenly much more interesting.

“I nearly totalled the car,” She finally said, with great hesitant, still playing with her button. “But, I mean, I _did_ swerve, it’s not _my_ fault there’s an office nearby.” 

She doesn’t dare steal a glance, but she knew Galen probably looked troubled, and maybe a bit heartbroken. Sometimes she thinks that her father was unfit to exist in any other place outside of his books and journals. She blew out another breath, slowly looked at him, and let out a long sigh. “I swear, Papa, it really wasn’t intentional—“

“I know,” He told her, cutting in. “It was an accident. Well, I’m glad you’re okay.”

She sucked in a breath, knowing that it’s not a full stop. There’s always a but. “But your mother and I probably had to take the car from you—“

“You can’t,” It was her turn to cut in, sharply. Her dad looked positively confused, as if he wasn’t expecting her to argue with him. As if that wasn’t what she had been doing all this time. “I need to get my license, so I can go to that concert next month with Cassian and Bodhi. We’d bought tickets and all.”

“I know, Stardust, and I’m sorry, but—“

“At least consult mum first,” Jyn pressed, knowing that she had full advantage. “She’ll know what to do.”

Her father sighed, his expression that of the usual _what am I ever going to do with you_ and perhaps also (in Jyn’s mind) _where did I go wrong in raising you_. He was wringing his hands, every sign of a man in distress. Jyn tentatively gave him a smile. “Please, Papa?”

His gaze settles heavily on her, but he gave her a small smile in return. “Fine. But only this time.”

“You’re the best,” She told him, crossing the distance between them and gave him a quick hug. “I love you.”

“I love you too, Stardust.”

* * *

Dinner had always been a hearty affair, with Lyra regaling them both with tales of her adventures both past and present (sometimes the ones she’d had with Galen, but other times the ones she’d had alone, or with friends), and them taking turns asking Jyn about her own day. As a child, she almost always looked forward to it, although nowadays she felt that they can be too nosy at times, and her mother’s stories lacking the same luster that she used to hear back in the day. She still told engaging stories, but Jyn’s interest in it had been dwindling.

There was no mention about what transpires between her and her father earlier that day in his study, so she kept her nose down and only answer the questions that she was asked.

It was near the end of it when her mother casually asked her if she had plans for tomorrow.  Jyn was about to open her mouth to answer, but then closes it again. She was indeed about to make something up, to wing it, and one of her friends probably wants to hang out tomorrow—she was really more about seeing where tomorrow would take her instead of planning things—but something wasn’t quite right. She had a _bad_ feeling about this.

“No plans?” Her mother continued, airily. “That’s good. Well, your dad and I are going to a conference tomorrow in Lothal, and since you’re free, you could probably use a driving lesson.”

“ _What driving lesson_?” She immediately mouthed, almost choking on her food. _This was bad this was bad this was bad_ , her brain screamed. Her mind raced, trying to find out possible scenarios, and she stabbed a carrot with her fork. She glanced at her dad, and he was suddenly looking very busy with his own dinner. She glared daggers at him from across the table.

“Since we’d be back by Sunday, Uncle Orson had agreed to look after you tomorrow. And teach you how to drive properly,” Her mother shrugged, looking every bit nonchalant, except for a mischievous twinkle in her eyes. Her dad was still really really busy with his dinner. Jyn doesn’t know which of them is worse.

“That man probably hasn’t drive his own car since gigantic reptiles walked on this planet,” She resentfully pointed out, stabbing other pieces of food with her fork. “Didn’t he had like, bodyguards or something? That doesn’t seem very much like a good idea to me.”

Plus, she added mentally, I’m an adult, I don’t need babysitting. They’d left her alone for conferences and stuff quite often anyways.

“He’s a good driver,” Her dad added, somehow sounding thoughtful about this. It makes Jyn all the more suspicious. “Used to show me the ropes a bit back in the day too,”

“And he’s a researcher,” Lyra added, matching Galen’s thoughtful expression. “I don’t think those are necessarily _bodyguards._ ” 

 _Don’t you hate him?_   Jyn wanted to ask her mother, but bit her tongue. Orson Krennic was her father’s longtime friend, an old one, according to him, and they used to do all sorts of things together— _best_ friends, from the sound of it—but as she grew up she began to realise that her mother wasn’t very fond of him. She had no idea why or what, and she doesn’t exactly care, but the animosity is there, and it was a little strange that her mother would suddenly be the one pitching this on the dinner table.

Maybe this is her idea of a punishment, a part of her said. She swallowed her meat, mulling it over.

“I’d do it if I can still go to the concert,” She told her parents, trying to keep her expression impassive.

“Done,” Her mother immediately answered, although it was clear that the matter wasn’t up for debate. Jyn put her eating utensils down.

“Don’t be rude to him,” Her father cautioned, always the peacemaking sort, but Jyn wasn’t really listening anymore.

She _had_ to get through tomorrow no matter how.

* * *

Her parents left early the next day, and when she woke up, they were already gone. She made herself some sandwiches, turning on the television while her mind was trying to form a plan.

Obviously, she could simply bail, and she could call Cassian to pick her up, but then her parents would be mad. She wasn’t as invested with her nonexistent relationship with Krennic—legend has it that he was supposed to be her godfather, though her mother objected, and they had only shared awkward hellos whenever he came to visit her father and not much more—to worry about his reaction, but she’d figured that he’d most likely tell her parents, and her punishment would then be so much worse.

Besides, that would probably disappoint her dad, and be that as it may, she doesn’t want to disappoint him.

So the only solution was to power through it. Jyn sighed, fetching herself ice cream from the freezer. It’s definitely too early to eat one, but she doesn’t care. She doesn’t know if she’d survive with her sanity intact.

She cycled through every information that she know about him: her father’s close friend, doesn’t get along that well with her mother for some reason, very rich or at least gave off that impression, supposedly married to his career, some sort of a military researcher. She knew the last one for fact, because she’d seen him in uniform once, when she was still a little girl, in a party her father attended. The “researcher” part is highly debatable, though. Cassian said that he’s probably in an intelligence agency of sorts.

A _spy_. Jyn mulled this concept over in her mind, turning it over like a shiny coin, finding it to her liking.

She was about to change the channel when the doorbell rings. Right on time.

“A minute!” She yelled, not caring if he heard her or not. She turned down the volume, put down the ice cream tub, and dashed to the door. 

A moment later she opened the door, and it was him all right. They stared at each other awkwardly for a second.

“Hey,” He started first, casually but not so because there’s an apparent edge to his voice, “Jane, right?”

She stared at him and wanted to laugh, but know that it’s probably impolite to do so. Besides, he’s trying, it’s apparent that he is, and Jyn decided that she would have mercy on him (at least this time). She shrugged and stepped aside to let him pass.

“ _Jyn_ , actually,” She corrected. “But whatever. Come on in.”

She doesn’t really stick around to pay attention to Krennic’s reaction, but instead walked on inside, counting on him to follow her. 

There was silence, and an awkwardness so palpable you could probably slice it with a laser, but Jyn tried her best to act casual. She plopped herself back on the sofa in front of the TV, picked her ice cream tub back up, and made herself comfortable. “Take a seat.”

It was a almost a full moment’s later that he finally sat down on the other edge of the sofa, stiffly. Jyn wanted to laugh, feeling almost sorry for him. Clearly this wasn’t Krennic’s idea of a good time, either.

“How’s your father?” He finally asked, breaking the silence (that was only punctuated by the sound of her demolishing her chocolate chip ice cream). 

“Fine, thanks,” She paused, taking the entire question in. “Didn’t you just talked to him? Via chat or email or whatever?”

“Well, yes,” He said, hands fluttering, expressing the first real emotion that day, although faintly: aggravation. He wasn’t as cool as he looked. “I did. But I just thought that I’d make sure.”

Jyn took a moment to take him in: Krennic was a few years younger than her father (who had hit 53), with greying light brown hair and bright blue eyes (darting here and there as they speak), and a medium build. He wasn’t as pale as her dad, who spent nearly all his time indoors, and Krennic was definitely more fit. He was wearing a casual black suit jacket over a plain white shirt with matching tailored black pants, watch, and shoes. 

If he wasn’t actually a spy, he at least had the look nailed down, she thought. She spooned more ice cream into her mouth.

“Should we start? Or are you going to finish eating all of that first?” He gestured at her ice cream tub. Unlike her dad, who either looked tired all the time or befuddled in some manner, Krennic looked positively commanding, with a downturned mouth that continually indicates how disappointed he is with everyone around him, or at least the speed in which they moved. She wondered how they became friends in the first place, him and her dad. It doesn’t seem like a very likely match. But then again, so is her mother and her father.

“I’m finished,” She said at last, mouth full of ice cream. Krennic’s thin lips twitched slightly, but she’s not sure yet what it signifies.

“Let’s go,” He simply said in return, and she stood up, fetching her keys.

Jyn wondered how he’d react if she told him that she’s going to finish her ice cream first. Probably not good, she thought. But, strange as it may seem, she felt an odd sort of kinship with him, a sense of fire.

Probably best not to dwell too much on that.

* * *

“Sorry for all the mess,” She told him as she unlocked her car, more of a lip service than anything. She doesn’t actually care about the mess—Lyra was probably the most organised of the Ersos, and she wasn’t very organised either—but she can’t quite get over the weird feeling of having him around. It wasn’t a bad one, per se, but she can’t quite explain it. It’s just simply _weird_.

Instead of saying the standard of _it’s alright_ or _it’s not a big deal,_ or even get into the car, Krennic simply took in her car, walked briskly to the side where she crashed it lately, and tapped it with his fingers (not a scientist’s fingers, she noted, more calloused and rough). “Is this the one your father told me about?”

“Yeah,” She’d gotten the driver’s seat door open, sticking her head back out to look at him. “That one. It was an accident.”

“Hmmm. It’s quite a bad one,” He tapped the side of the car again, and Jyn focused her gaze on him. “I can understand why Galen would be so worried. But it can be fixed.”

“He would probably cut my allowance,” She replied, feeling bitterness seeping to her voice, making no attempt to mask it. “I don’t understand why it’s such a big deal.”

She was fully expecting him to defend her father, to give her one of those adult talks about the Importance of Being Responsible (her mother’s favourite topic, which is pretty rich coming from her, since she’s very much like her daughter in a lot of respects), and she was already steeling herself mentally. 

To her surprise, Krennic fixed his gaze on her, startlingly intense, and he instead said: “He did something like this once. Worse. I had to bail him out.”

She doesn’t quite know how to respond to that (should she laugh? ask about it? she had not the slightest idea, god help her), so she just stood there, mouth slightly agape. The idea of her father, almost totalling a car, was so absurd that Jyn needed a moment to digest it. Krennic, probably tired of waiting for a response, opened the door to the front passenger’s seat. “If you’re just going to stand there all day, we might as well start. I’ll show you first.”

His brisk and impatient manner would probably rub a person with a thinner skin off, but Jyn had a very thick skin, courtesy of being an only child, and a rather wild one at that. Like everything else, she simply shrugged it off. “Sure thing. Let’s switch places.”

She doesn’t quite know how to call him, since “uncle” seemed a bit preposterous—they had no blood relation, plus it was just awkward—and “Uncle Orson” was way _weirder_. In any case, he doesn’t seem very much like an uncle-y type. Or a familial type of any sort. It was rather weird to think that _he_ had a family. He was rather like her professors and lecturers in that respect.

“Just Orson would be fine,” He told her after they were both seated, him behind the wheels, she sitting shotgun beside him. “I’m not particularly fond of familial titles, or whatever you had in mind.”

It was as if he was reading her mind, and it threw her off. Jyn tried to think of a suitable response, and failed. “Alright,” She finally said, the only thing that came to mind. “I don’t think any of those suit you, anyway.”

She was putting her foot in her mouth, but she doesn’t really care. It’s not that she wanted to be here, and it’s quite obvious that the feeling was mutual. He shot her a look, indecipherable, and started the car, looking very much out of place in _her_ driver’s seat, behind _her_ wheels, with his neatly-styled hair and his expensive clothing and shoes that would probably cost her a liver, a kidney, and her right arm, at least, if she ever tried to buy it.

Jyn liked him.

* * *

“So what did you actually do?” She asked him, at some point, after the lesson started. He was a good teacher, surprisingly; not very patient, and Jyn got the sneaking sense that he wanted to cuss her out a couple of times for being a dense idiot (he doesn’t, but it’s obvious he wanted to, and from someone with terrible self-control, it was apparent that Krennic was struggling with the same issue), but he makes up for it in other areas (she hates people who holds her hand when learning things, and his style of telling her like it is suits her just well, strangely). She was on the driver’s seat now, and he was directing her instead of the GPS.

“You’re in the military, right? Army, Navy, or Airforce?” She knew that she was probably dancing with her death, as she get the strong sense that she wasn’t supposed to ask that, but Jyn Erso likes asking all the wrong questions (sometimes they get you the right answers). 

“Turn left,” He gestured, expression flat. “Don’t forget to look around you, or you’ll smash us to another car and we’ll be dead. I’m not sure I can be held responsible to your father about _that_.”

“Yes, Sir,” She gave him a mock salute, and watch his reaction from the corner of her eye. He was still impassive, looking out at the road. Krennic was almost no fun at all. Jyn huffed silently.

“I’m an engineer,” He finally responded, much to Jyn’s surprise. She waited for more, but it didn’t came.

“Really? My mother said you were a researcher,” She kept her eyes on the road to avoid his wrath, but didn’t miss the little twitch on the corner of his eyes when she mentioned her mother (or was it “researcher”?). Curious and curiouser.

“That’s not entirely wrong,” He remarked, gaze meeting hers, briefly. She then tried to picture him as a builder, not a soldier, or a scientist like her father, but it was quite a tough thing, even for Jyn’s relatively overactive imagination. There was a certain quality to him that was hard to place. Jyn furrowed her brow, trying to concentrate on the road and his instructions.

Their conversation (more like a monologue, but she’s not a quitter) was cut short when someone cuts them off suddenly, and for the first time that day (and the first time ever), she heard Krennic swore under his breath. 

“Are you _blind_? Use your damn brakes!”

She burst out laughing, wholly inappropriate at that time, and sped up instead, swerving past the offender while honking at them loudly. She might also flashed them the finger. There was a moment of tense silence, and for a second she wondered if she’d screwed up the day royally. 

“God, Jyn,” Krennic sighed, massaging his temple. “If you get us both killed, Galen will have my neck.”

“But it’s fun, right?” She grinned, turning the music on and the volume up. One of the perks of having her own car is that she never, ever have to hear her mother’s weird Bothan chantings (she called it “ethnic music”, whatever that means) or her dad’s sappy jazz numbers again. She loved both her parents dearly, but at the same time she thinks that they both have an extremely weird if not sucky taste in music. At least her car wouldn’t feel like some old timey cantina. 

“I like this song,” Krennic remarked, and Jyn was almost impressed at his ability to continually surprise her. She knew that he was a lively sort of guy around her dad and their friends (she’d also eavesdrop several of his less…pleasant conversations with her mother, and their repartees and verbal batterings was _legendary_ ), but she certainly wasn’t expecting this. Still, she had to test him.

“I like their first album better,” She dodged another car on the road, tapping her fingers to the rhythm, “But this is my favourite song.”

“The Twi’lek bit was perhaps unnecessary,” He offered, directing her to an emptier lane. “But that’s pretty much true.”

Another silence, more comfortable this time. Jyn was about to ask him more about his work, but he broke the silence first. “Your dad used to hate it if I put on this sort of music. He said that it hurts his ears. I told him he had no taste.”

Jyn snorted, could very well imagine, now, her dad and Krennic in their younger days, arguing about music. It was a frankly amusing image, and she rather liked it. “He likes sappy jazz scores, waxing poetry about the beauty of Tattooine desert and all that. Was he always like that?”

“Sadly, yes,” The man beside her confirmed, looking very much amused and suddenly alive. He was obviously masking his laugh with a cough. “That’s the problem with Galen Erso.”

She visibly relaxed, her interest in the conversation rising astronomically. It was strange, to think that her father once had been in her position, worrying about pretty much the same things that she did, making the same mistakes. She’d heard a lot about Lyra’s youth, since her mother wasn’t the sort to hold back stories (if anything she was positively overflowing with them), but her father was more of a shyer sort. It never occurred to her that her father had stories, too, and that he wasn’t always the way he is.

“What was he like back then?” Jyn blurted out, perhaps ungracefully, but she was curious, and it burned in her like a fire. 

“Quiet,” Krennic told her, silently putting on the GPS. They were passing the places familiar to her, going on in circles a bit, but she doesn’t really mind. As long as she gets to hear his stories about her father, she doesn’t really mind. “What they would call brilliant,” He continued, after a slight pause, “But shy. Can’t hold his tongue, though. Can’t hold his drink either, when you think about it.”

Jyn smiled, humming in tune with the music to herself. That does sound like her father. 

“He gets into fights, because of the things that he can’t hold back saying, and I bailed him out of them,” He continued, deep in thought, leaning back on his seat. “The things that we did together. The things that we could _accomplish_ together,” He added.

Jyn felt it again, that fire, that determination, lurking just underneath the surface. What he said makes her think of Cassian—frequently her partner-in-crime, always and forever bailing her out of troubles, having each other’s backs. The difference here is that Cassian was the cool-headed one, whereas she incites things. She was actively courting trouble, and causing her dad endless headaches (and heartaches). She glanced at Krennic, trying to imagine him as a younger man, her age, perhaps.

Strangely, it wasn’t quite such a tough job anymore.

“So what did you build?” She asked him, diverting the topic, sensing landmines ahead if she continued with her present course. It was perhaps the second worst question she could ask him (the first would be to ask him why he think that he and her father could have accomplished so much more, in his opinion), but it’s not like she had a breadth of questions to choose from. Asking about Krennic’s personal life would definitely bring back the awkwardness, not to mention that it’d be weird coming from her—his friend’s daughter. So she kept her head up and pressed on.

“Military installations,” He responded, and she raised an eyebrow at his suddenly clipped tone. She thought that they’d built a _rapport_ here. She turned her attention to her music. “But civilian buildings, too. I oversee a lot of government construction projects.”

“But that’s not all, isn’t it?” Her mother would probably glare at her if she heard her speaking insolently like this (although, considering who Jyn is speaking to, she probably secretly approved), but the words were out before Jyn could think it through, and she quickly shrugged it off. Whatever he think of her, however he’s going to respond, well, that’s not really any of her concern, isn’t it?

Besides, it was obvious that there was more to Orson Krennic than meets the eye. Her gut feeling were rarely wrong.

“It’s a secret,” He said, lips quirking slightly up in a tiny, amused smile, the first that day. “It’s classified. I can’t tell you.”

“Telling people that it’s a secret kind of defeats the entire point of it being a hush-hush government secret,” She countered, switching the music to the radio station, cringing when that one overhyped Bith band burst out with their equally overhyped number one hit single, quickly changing the station. She found one that doesn't offend her senses.

“So between you and me,” Jyn continued, turning around a corner, “What is it about? I can keep a secret.”

She would _definitely_ tell Cassian, and probably Bodhi too, but that doesn’t really count. She stole a glance at him from the corner of her eye. Krennic was definitely frowning, going through some secret list in his head. He really _was_ a spy. She’d win that bet with Cassian. 

“Weapons,” He replied, not completely unexpected. The edge that she’d heard earlier—when he arrived at her front door—returned, and he’s tensing a little. “But that’s all I can say. Don’t try to ask more.”

Jyn took a moment to think about this, wrestling with the moral implications, wanting to tell him that’s wrong, but bit her tongue and asked a more pressing question instead. “Does my dad knows?”

“He doesn’t,” Krennic told her, and she nodded, fully expecting that. “I’m not planning to.”

“Good,” She simply said, changing the radio station again, “Keep him out of it.”

In hindsight, it was perhaps wasn’t a very good idea to tell someone like him that—someone as powerful and as influential as Krennic, and who’d known her father since forever—but Jyn naturally felt protective of her father. She was closer to him than she was her mother (perhaps it was because of her and Lyra’s all-too similar temperament), and she adored Galen, and still is. She would kill for her father, and she's not afraid of Krennic.

There was a long pause, in which she lose herself in the music, and she wasn’t expecting much of an answer, anyway. But she saw him nod, grudgingly, from the corner of her eye, and it was more than she could ask for. She smiled.

“I think it’s past lunchtime,” She pointed out, as the conversation stalled once again.

“Turn around that corner,” He ordered, after a brief glance at his watch. “There’s a nice Brentaalian restaurant there. My treat.”

“I’d love that,” She chose to bypass the obvious, namely, the fact that she naturally assumed that he would take responsibility for what she called adult things that day, since her parents pretty much dumped her in his care. “I’m starving.”

“You used to be the equivalent of a tiny rancor beast when you were a child,” Krennic pointed out with a somewhat smug look. “Hope you don’t mind being seen with an older man. You can say that I’m your dad if you happen to meet someone you know.”

She’s not quite sure about his thought process here (although to be honest, he wasn’t so bad on the eyes, quite the opposite—she’d never be caught dead admitting that, though, especially not to Cassian), but he was definitely pulling her leg. She got her mischievous face on. “We look _nothing_ alike. And I’m thankful for that.”

That elicited a small laugh from him, and she gave him a mock bow of sorts. As far as she could manage, anyway, since she was still behind the wheel.

“Careful now. Wouldn’t want you to hit another office building.”

He actually looked so smug while he was saying that, and she’s not sure if she wanted to punch him in the face, or if she wanted to laugh. Jyn now had the inkling as to why her father was so fond of him, and why they got along despite the vast difference in character.

Suddenly she doesn’t quite want this day to end.

* * *

It was afternoon when they got back to her house, her belly full, and her head was also full, in a different way—she asked him a lot of questions, mainly revolving around and concerning her dad, and he asked her the basic questions: what major she took, what sort of career she wanted to pursue after graduation, and so on and so forth. Jyn doesn’t particularly care about the latter (she rather thought that her life would sort itself out on its own, eventually), but the former was of interest to her, and she got a lot of incriminating evidence on her father. 

For example, she know knew for sure that they met in the government’s gifted program, and her dad was apparently very good at neglecting housework. The latter was something that she can get behind, since she often bear the brunt of doing her father’s chores, especially when he was deep in a research. 

Jyn still wasn’t quite sure what to think of Krennic—she strangely liked him, felt that they were alike in some ways, though she’s not quite sure that he’s aware of that—but she felt that she understood her father a little better, thanks to him. It was a strange arrangement, and it was even stranger that they got along. 

Her mother—and probably her father as well—definitely wouldn’t expect that.

“Well, that wasn’t quite as terrible as I’d imagined it to be,” He remarked, as she fished out the key to her house. She quirked a smile.

“Not as terrible as I’d imagined it to be, either,” She quipped. “It was more horrendous than I thought.”

She unlocked the door, but didn’t immediately get in, instead turned back to look at him. He looked—what was that word again—pensive. As if the cogs and wheels in his brain were turning round and round over something, but she’s not privy to that. Jyn wondered about it.

“You’re not half as horrible as my co-workers, at least,” Krennic reassured her, looking as if he was about to offer a friendly gesture of sorts, but decided against it, putting his hands into his pockets instead. It was a strange look that really doesn’t quite fit her image of him, at least until now. She laughed, a genuine sound.

“Are you going to babysit me for the rest of the day now, or what? What were my parents’ order, exactly?”

She wanted to say that she did not mind. She wanted to say that, hell, she could probably finish that ice cream now (did she or did she not put it back in the freezer? she can’t remember) and he could definitely have some, if he wants to. She wanted to say that they could probably listen to more of the band they’d listened to in the car, or watch movies. What sort of movie would he like? She wondered.

He looked like he was about to say yes, or at least about to say something, when his phone rings. “Excuse me,” He mumbled, taking the noisy thing out of his pocket. Jyn watched him frown (a now familiar frown) as he looked at the number. “Looks like I have to go,” He told her, putting his phone back, still ringing. “I can’t stay. I’ll tell Galen. You’ll be fine on your own, right?”

It was her turn to frown, and she’d be lying if she said that she doesn’t feel at least slightly disappointed, but she pushed it aside. Jyn affected a shrug. “Sure. I’m used to it. I’m an adult now, anyway.”

Krennic nodded, and looks like he’s about to leave—his phone had started ringing again, the most terrible noise in the world, and it was one of those generic bland ringtones—but didn’t. They stared awkwardly at each other, and Jyn knew that she probably should say something, to officially end the day.

“Was it one of your top secret projects?” She instead said, and he was so caught off guard (the look on his face was _priceless_ ) that he laughed a full-throated laugh, the first she’d heard that day. She joined him not long after.

“You never really ran out of verbal ammunition, don’t you?” He said, after they were done laughing, cocking his head like he was assessing her. _Just like your mother_ , she fully expected him to say, but as with all her expectations with him, it didn’t happen.

“That’s me. Anyway, I think you’d be interested to know that we think you’re some sort of a spy,” Jyn continued, perhaps in a vain effort to delay his inevitable departure. Krennic’s phone had stopped ringing, but he glanced at his back every now and then, stealing a glance at his watch, as well. Whatever it was, it was definitely important. But it wasn’t important to Jyn Erso.

In any case, her statement elicited the expected reaction (at last), and he looked at her curiously. “ _We_? Who is this ‘we’ you’re talking about?” 

He was obviously positively amused by this, and momentarily forgotten his important appointment. She glanced at her sides, then over her shoulder, affecting a secretive look. “Oh, nobody. Just me and a couple of friends.”

Specifically her and Cassian, and also probably Bodhi (who knew her dad too, and who probably told the weird old couple living next door to him, they got along for some reason), but there was really no need to mention that. 

“What if I told you I am?” Krennic looked like he got a lot of questions to ask her, but he chose that one. She knew that he was pulling her leg, again, and she played along.

“Means I won the bet,” 

“Oh. Well, good luck then.” 

“It was supposed to be, ‘may the Force be with you’, my mother told me.” He already looked fairly impatient at this point, but it could be that he’s just naturally nervous, although he hid it so much better than her father. Jyn wanted to stretch this moment for as long as she humanly could, anyway.

“I don’t buy the entire religious mumbo-jumbo.” 

Their eyes met for a fraction of second, something settling in between them, slipping beyond the reach of words, and he finally said: “I’m going now, Jyn.”

It wasn’t as if they would never going to meet again. It was an odd sort of goodbye: neither here, nor quite there. She was never good with goodbyes. And apparently, so does Krennic, because he just turned back and started to walk away, not saying anything else.

“You’re an odd sort, Orson,” She called after him. He didn’t stop, but glanced back for a bit. “Don’t tell my dad bad things about me,” She continued, before he'd already gone too far. She’s probably already disturbing the neighbours, but she doesn’t really care. She wanted to ask if he’s going to drop by again anytime soon, but she wasn’t sure how to breach the topic without sounding awkward. 

“You’re not such a terrible driver,” He said in return, just when she was about to turn around and go inside. “Not half as bad as Galen. I’ll probably drop by for dinner tomorrow. Your dad insists.”

He was gone out of view before she could respond to that, but Jyn knew that tomorrow night is going to be _very interesting_.

 _Bet you weren’t expecting that, ma, pa_ , she thought to herself, smiling smugly before she got inside and locked the door behind her.

  

**Author's Note:**

> [The Modern AU Krennic Look™](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGMxRi9ITpg). hmu on [tumblr](http://officialvoid.co.vu). Comments & suggestions welcome, thanks for reading! xx


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